A disciplinary panel at Ohio University has told two mechanical-engineering students who were accused of plagiarism to rewrite their master’s theses, while a third student was exonerated, according to The Columbus Dispatch. The three are the only current students among 37 people suspected of having plagiarized master’s and doctoral theses over a 20-year period (The Chronicle, August 24).

An investigation sparked by a former graduate student found that plagiarism at the university’s Russ College of Engineering and Technology had been “rampant and flagrant” over the past two decades. The university has already disciplined some faculty members, and it has notified graduates suspected of plagiarism that they must forfeit their degrees, contest the charges, or ask to rewrite their theses.

The thesis by the student who was exonerated was found to have been the source of material copied by other students.